The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 01, 2001
Filed:
Dec. 04, 1997
Kevin J. O'Neill, Jr., Alpharetta, GA (US);
Mahendra Varman, Omaha, NE (US);
Minolta-QMS, Inc., Mobile, AL (US);
Abstract
In a method and apparatus for obtaining a hard copy of an electronic image, a plurality of image luminescence values corresponding to pixels of an electronic image are received and a probability distribution of the plurality of image luminescence values is generated. Each image luminescence value has a first binary bit length. From the probability distribution, the luminescence values having less than a desired quantity of image luminescence values associated therewith are determined. Two or more adjacent groups of continuous luminescence values are identified from the probability distribution. Each luminescence value of each group has greater than or equal to the desired quantity of image luminescence values associated therewith. The two or more adjacent groups are separated by one or more of the luminescence values having less than the desired quantity of image luminescence values associated therewith. The two or more adjacent groups of image luminescence values and the luminescence values therebetween are scaled to obtain a plurality of printer luminescence values having a second bit length less than the first bit length. The printer luminescence values are printed to obtain a hard copy of the electronic image.